Our earnings landscape is shifting.

Ten years ago the average
full-time adult male worker in NSW took home more than his counterpart
in Western Australia by a margin of $70 per week.

These days Western Australian men outpace NSW men by $335 per week.
Western Australia eclipsed the Australian Capital Territory as the
highest earning state or territory more than a year ago.

For women the margins between states are little changed, suggesting
Western Australia’s earnings growth is being driven by the
male-dominated mining and construction industries.

Mining workers are by far Australia’s highest paid according to the
Bureau of Statistics figures with full-time men in thee industry taking
home an average of $120,100 per year. Full-time women in the industry
take home $91,100...

The worst-paying industries are retail sales and
accommodation & food services, each paying both men and women an
average of around $51,100.

The ABS figures appear to show the male-female wage gap widening to a 25
year high but Melbourne Institute labour specialist Mark Wooden
believes the averages may reflect the changes in the composition of the
workforce rather than changes in wages themselves.

“It employment in the low-wage jobs in the services sector was growing,
and if those jobs were prominently filled by women that could push down
average female wages without pushing down any actual wages,” he told the
Herald.

“If employment in low-wage jobs in manufacturing was falling, and if
those jobs were predominantly filled by men that could push up average
male wages without pushing up actual wages,” he said.

The fastest growing average wages over the past year have been in
wholesale trade (up 11.9 per cent), health care and social assistance
(up 6.9 per cent), arts and recreation (up 5.5 per cent) and
construction (up 5.4 per cent), and accommodation & food services (5
per cent).

Wages growth has been the weakest in administrative and support services
(down 2.8 per cent), rental hiring & real estate (down 0.1 per
cent).

Mining wages, previously increasing strongly, grew 4.8 per cent. Across
all industries average full-time wages grew 5.1 per cent, a
comfortable margin above the inflation rate of 3.5 per cent.

“These figures won’t alarm the Reserve Bank,” said Commonwealth
Securities economist Savanth Sebastian. “They tend tends to overstate
growth in wages, as the balance or workers shifts from full-time to
part-time and shifts across industry sectors.”